Abstract
Human communication and language skills rely heavily on the ability to detect and process auditory inputs. This paper reviews possible applications of the event-related potential (ERP) technique to the study of cortical mechanisms supporting human auditory processing, including speech stimuli. Following a brief introduction to the ERP methodology, the remaining sections focus on demonstrating how ERPs can be used in humans to address research questions related to cortical organization, maturation and plasticity, as well as the effects of sensory deprivation, and multisensory interactions. The review is intended to serve as a primer for researchers interested in using ERPs for the study of the human auditory system.
Highlights
The ability to detect and process auditory inputs plays a major role in human communication
This review focuses on the uses of scalp-recorded cortical event-related potentials (ERPs) for investigation of human auditory function
Given the interpretation of the auditory N1 as reflecting stimulus feature analysis [147], these findings suggest that lip movements may facilitate feature analysis of the syllables in the auditory cortex, an interpretation consistent with the behavioral evidence of faster identification of multimodal compared to auditory syllables [144,148]
Summary
The ability to detect and process auditory inputs plays a major role in human communication. Advancements in non-invasive neuroimaging techniques (e.g., functional magnetic resonance imaging, fMRI; electroencephalography, EEG; magnetoencephalography, MEG; optical imaging) provide an opportunity to examine various aspects of human auditory cortex functions. These methods have yielded valuable results replicating and extending findings from the animal models. From this review it should be clear that ERPs can be a valuable tool for investigating a wide range of questions concerning neural mechanisms supporting human auditory processing and provide novel insights into brain-behavior connections in the area of speech and language
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